Why Xi's Anti-Corruption Campaign Won't Work

John Lee
, ContributorOpinions expressed by Forbes Contributors are their own.

Another week and another senior official is caught by President Xi Jinping’s anti-corruption campaign. Wang Baoan, Director of the National Bureau of Statistics, was arrested for ‘serious disciplinary violations’ last Tuesday. The precise nature of the alleged violations have not been revealed but they are likely related to his previous role as deputy minister in the Ministry of Finance. Given that there is an estimated 99% conviction rate once one is arrested and investigated for 'disciplinary violations’, Wang’s chances for acquittal are not looking good.

Xi’s anti-corruption campaign might be ruthless in that those accused are denied due process with which to defend themselves, but the common wisdom is that this is exactly what China and the Communist Party needs. According to data produced by organizations such as Transparency International, China rates poorly on all matters related to corruption. Crooked officials and Party members have become the number one complaint of citizens in the country.

Isn’t Xi responding as any good President of the country, and General Secretary of the Party ought to? Perhaps, but the campaign will never extend deep or far enough to really sweep away corruption in China to any significant extent no matter how many Chinese Communist Party members are demoted or placed in already crowded Chinese jails.

Xi's anti-corruption campaign is not a new idea, but this time it's different

Anti-corruption campaigns are hardly new in China. But Xi has taken it to a new level.

Under the current President, targets are secretly chosen and swiftly investigated by the Central Discipline Inspection Commission, the country’s most powerful and feared Star Chamber. Striking without warning is a big part of the scare tactic. On the day he was arrested, Wang was wearing his National Bureau of Statistics hat and in fine and feisty spirit at a press conference, dismissing bearish comments on the Chinese economy by hedge fund billionaire George Soros. Presumably, he had no idea what was to occur just hours later.

The Commission is answerable to Xi personally, and acts on behalf of the Party rather than the state. The clear message is that Xi runs the Party, and the Party still rules over China.

Former top Communist Zhou Yongkang rose through China's state oil industry to become internal security chief--and amassed so much power, according to analysts, that he brought about his own downfall. (STR/AFP/Getty Images)

Since 2013, over 200,000 officials and Party members have been investigated, with a 99% rate of conviction. Compare this to the few thousand that were brought down each year in the previous Hu Jintao era. Those caught in the present era include not just lowly officials but heavyweights at the highest levels such as Zhou Yongkang, a former member of the all-powerful Politburo Standing Committee and then head of China’s fearsome security and law enforcement institutions. The former Chongqing chief, Bo Xilai, was jailed by the same process in 2013. There has been hundreds of other senior officials, bureaucrats and executives from powerful state-owned-enterprises or SOEs targeted. As Xi promised, it has been a case of not only swatting ‘flies’ but killing ‘tigers’.

In walking this line, Xi has accumulated respect and resentment in equal measure, with the latter likely to be the stronger and lasting sentiment. In Chinese politics, enemies have longer memories than friends even if the President’s detractors are quiet for the moment. Even so, one might expect that the campaign will enhance the standing and legitimacy of the Party, albeit at great personal risk to Xi and his presidency.